WEBVTT - From the Vault: Trains of Terror, Part 1 0:00:06.440 --> 0:00:08.880 Hey, you welcome to Stuff to Blow your Mind. My 0:00:09.039 --> 0:00:12.000 name is Robert Lamb. We're off this week for fall break, 0:00:12.039 --> 0:00:15.160 but we have some horror related content from last year 0:00:15.200 --> 0:00:17.120 for you. This is going to be Trains of Terror 0:00:17.160 --> 0:00:22.160 Part one, originally published October first, twenty twenty four. There's 0:00:22.200 --> 0:00:26.040 all sorts of scary train related topics discussed within, So 0:00:26.200 --> 0:00:32.840 let's grab a ticket and all aboard. Welcome to Stuff 0:00:32.880 --> 0:00:42.640 to Blow your Mind production of iHeartRadio. Hey you welcome 0:00:42.680 --> 0:00:45.600 to Stuff to Blow your Mind. My name is Robert Lamb. 0:00:45.600 --> 0:00:49.120 And I am Joe McCormick. And today is a thrilling 0:00:49.159 --> 0:00:52.400 occasion for us here on the podcast because this very 0:00:52.440 --> 0:00:56.920 episode is publishing on Tuesday, October first, twenty twenty four, 0:00:57.200 --> 0:01:00.600 which makes it the inaugural entry in our tradition month 0:01:00.680 --> 0:01:05.520 long celebration of Halloween. So longtime fans, you know what's 0:01:05.560 --> 0:01:07.600 going on, you know what's in store. But in case 0:01:07.640 --> 0:01:10.440 you're new to the show, the pitch is that every 0:01:10.480 --> 0:01:13.600 October on Stuff to Blow your Mind, we devote all 0:01:13.680 --> 0:01:19.720 of that month's core episodes two topics related to monsters, ghosts, demons, curses, 0:01:19.760 --> 0:01:23.000 and horror Halloween stuff, and also for our weird House 0:01:23.040 --> 0:01:26.039 Cinema episodes for the Fridays of this month, we're going 0:01:26.120 --> 0:01:27.759 to be looking at horror movies. 0:01:28.319 --> 0:01:30.920 That's right. October is the month when you can turn 0:01:30.959 --> 0:01:32.440 to stuff to blow your mind and find that we 0:01:32.440 --> 0:01:34.800 were doing horror and monster stuff one hundred percent of 0:01:34.840 --> 0:01:37.560 the time as opposed to our normal like, I don't know, 0:01:37.760 --> 0:01:39.479 thirty five to forty percent of the time. 0:01:39.680 --> 0:01:41.720 That's right, people have pointed out before. I mean, we're 0:01:41.800 --> 0:01:43.720 you know, we got monsters on the brain. That's kind 0:01:43.760 --> 0:01:46.080 of how we are. So throughout the year you'll get 0:01:46.080 --> 0:01:48.920 a smattering, but for October it's it's all we do. 0:01:49.360 --> 0:01:51.800 And I'm excited about the episode we're going to kick 0:01:51.800 --> 0:01:54.600 off here today. The series rikicking off here today because 0:01:54.600 --> 0:01:56.840 this is a topic we've been talking about doing for 0:01:57.000 --> 0:02:00.440 years now. This is well when we get around planning 0:02:00.440 --> 0:02:03.000 out our October episodes, this one's been on the list 0:02:03.040 --> 0:02:05.320 for a while and we're finally hopping aboard. 0:02:05.560 --> 0:02:07.280 Yeah. I wonder why it took us this long. I 0:02:07.320 --> 0:02:09.680 don't think there's a particular reason. Just shook out that way. 0:02:10.400 --> 0:02:14.240 But today we're beginning a series on locomotive horror, the 0:02:14.280 --> 0:02:18.160 mini Shades of Menace and supernatural fright that we have 0:02:18.240 --> 0:02:22.880 projected onto trains. Now, this is a topic that's going 0:02:22.960 --> 0:02:26.680 to take us into a bunch of different realms of folklore, history, science, 0:02:26.720 --> 0:02:29.960 and technology. But I think the best place to begin 0:02:30.040 --> 0:02:34.040 here is to look at some famous examples of trains 0:02:34.040 --> 0:02:36.760 in horror fiction and rob If you don't mind, I 0:02:36.800 --> 0:02:39.280 want to kick things off with an example of a 0:02:39.320 --> 0:02:41.280 story that I just read in full for the first 0:02:41.320 --> 0:02:42.680 time this weekend. 0:02:43.320 --> 0:02:45.000 Yeah, let's have it, okay. 0:02:45.000 --> 0:02:49.000 So the story in question is a short tale of ghosts, 0:02:49.120 --> 0:02:53.280 spectral visions, and premonitions by Charles Dickens, and it's called 0:02:53.520 --> 0:02:57.720 The Signalman. This story was published in eighteen sixty six 0:02:57.840 --> 0:03:01.000 as part of a set of short stories by Dickens 0:03:01.000 --> 0:03:03.680 and a handful of other authors, with the collection as 0:03:03.720 --> 0:03:06.440 a whole called Mugby Junction. So there's sort of a 0:03:06.440 --> 0:03:11.120 locomotive and railroad theme running throughout. This collection was a 0:03:11.280 --> 0:03:15.600 special Christmas edition of a magazine that Dickens founded called 0:03:15.680 --> 0:03:18.519 All the Year Round. And I'm going to briefly summarize 0:03:18.560 --> 0:03:21.480 the story, including the ending, So as a warning, if 0:03:21.480 --> 0:03:23.560 you want to read it without having the ending spoiled, 0:03:23.880 --> 0:03:26.160 you could pause and do that. Now it's fairly short. 0:03:26.200 --> 0:03:28.040 It only takes like twenty minutes or so to read. 0:03:29.320 --> 0:03:33.520 The Signalman begins with an unnamed narrator who wanders to 0:03:33.600 --> 0:03:36.600 the edge of a huge trench in the earth around 0:03:36.640 --> 0:03:39.720 sunset one day, and at the bottom of this trench 0:03:39.960 --> 0:03:43.480 there is a railway line leading into a dark tunnel, 0:03:43.680 --> 0:03:45.720 and at the edge of the tunnel, beside the tracks 0:03:45.760 --> 0:03:49.560 there is a tiny box like signal house and the 0:03:49.640 --> 0:03:53.720 signalman who works it. So a bit of historical context 0:03:53.840 --> 0:03:57.560 that helps you understand the story better. In the nineteenth century, 0:03:57.880 --> 0:04:02.400 signal operators were a crucial part of railroads. These were 0:04:02.480 --> 0:04:06.840 workers who had to stay at little houses beside the tracks, 0:04:07.200 --> 0:04:10.400 and they would be equipped with lights and colored flags 0:04:10.760 --> 0:04:14.080 and usually a telegraph line to relay information to and 0:04:14.160 --> 0:04:18.279 about passing trains, which meant that signalers were pivotal to 0:04:18.560 --> 0:04:23.280 railroad safety. They gave the trains information, they passed the 0:04:23.320 --> 0:04:27.160 information via flags or sometimes even shouted verbal signals. They 0:04:27.200 --> 0:04:30.640 passed information to oncoming engine drivers, and this could be 0:04:30.680 --> 0:04:33.919 information about the conditions of the tracks ahead, like is 0:04:33.920 --> 0:04:37.200 there an obstruction, a flood, some of their kind of problem, 0:04:37.640 --> 0:04:40.120 or about the movements of other trains, like was there 0:04:40.160 --> 0:04:42.919 a train stalled on the tracks ahead or somewhere it 0:04:42.920 --> 0:04:46.880 shouldn't be. And they also kept information about when trains 0:04:47.000 --> 0:04:49.760 passed to make sure everything was running on schedule and 0:04:49.960 --> 0:04:53.200 alert other stations and trains if there was some kind 0:04:53.240 --> 0:04:56.839 of danger or delay. They were also sometimes responsible for 0:04:56.920 --> 0:04:59.760 operating track switches to divert the course of a train 0:05:00.120 --> 0:05:02.880 there's a fork in the line. But because of the 0:05:02.960 --> 0:05:07.600 nature of their work, signal operators were sometimes characterized as 0:05:07.680 --> 0:05:11.480 kind of pitiable people. Like it was stressful work because 0:05:11.560 --> 0:05:14.240 the lives of many people were in their hands. If 0:05:14.279 --> 0:05:17.560 they made a mistake, it could lead to disaster. But 0:05:17.600 --> 0:05:20.760 it was also isolated, lonely work because they would be 0:05:20.960 --> 0:05:25.160 spending long shifts by themselves in remote and sometimes unpleasant 0:05:25.200 --> 0:05:28.880 locations along the rail lines. So anyway back to the story. 0:05:29.200 --> 0:05:31.960 The narrator comes to a deep cutting in the earth 0:05:32.279 --> 0:05:34.719 at the emergence of a rail tunnel, and he looks 0:05:34.760 --> 0:05:37.520 down into it and sees this tiny signal house and 0:05:37.560 --> 0:05:40.800 the man who works there standing at the door. Curious. 0:05:40.839 --> 0:05:43.760 The narrator calls out and says, Helloa, it's that one 0:05:43.760 --> 0:05:47.599 of those hellos that spelled halloa, or how you say that, 0:05:47.640 --> 0:05:50.839 do you say the oa? Or is that just oh hello, 0:05:52.000 --> 0:05:52.360 I die. 0:05:52.360 --> 0:05:52.960 I'm not sure. 0:05:53.360 --> 0:05:57.560 It's like balbo helloa below there, He's trying to get 0:05:57.560 --> 0:06:00.880 the man's attention. The man at first seemed confused and 0:06:00.920 --> 0:06:05.000 even frightened, but then reluctantly invites the narrator down a 0:06:05.040 --> 0:06:07.520 hidden pathway to meet him. And here I'm going to 0:06:07.560 --> 0:06:11.159 read a descriptive passage to communicate the atmosphere of the story. 0:06:12.040 --> 0:06:15.520 The narrator says his post was in as solitary and 0:06:15.560 --> 0:06:18.719 dismal a place as I ever saw. On either side, 0:06:18.839 --> 0:06:22.800 a dripping, wet wall of jagged stone, excluding all view 0:06:22.880 --> 0:06:26.119 but a strip of sky. The perspective one way only 0:06:26.160 --> 0:06:30.520 a crooked prolongation of this great dungeon, the shorter perspective 0:06:30.600 --> 0:06:33.960 in the other direction, terminating in a gloomy red light, 0:06:34.320 --> 0:06:37.479 and the gloomier entrance to a black tunnel, in whose 0:06:37.520 --> 0:06:41.880 massive architecture there was a barbarous, depressing and forbidding air. 0:06:42.520 --> 0:06:45.400 So little sunlight ever found its way to this spot 0:06:45.560 --> 0:06:48.719 that it had an earthy, deadly smell, and so much 0:06:48.839 --> 0:06:52.039 cold wind rushed through it that it struck chill to 0:06:52.080 --> 0:06:54.719 me as if I had left the natural world. 0:06:55.440 --> 0:06:58.520 Ooh, that is nice. 0:06:57.440 --> 0:07:01.560 Anyway, the narrator notices that the signal man is acting weird. 0:07:01.720 --> 0:07:06.000 He's preoccupied, even a bit haunted, And they eventually get 0:07:06.040 --> 0:07:09.600 to know one another and become familiar, and after some 0:07:09.680 --> 0:07:12.880 time has passed between them, the signalman confesses what it 0:07:12.960 --> 0:07:17.920 is that's troubling him. At several times past, the signalman 0:07:18.080 --> 0:07:21.760 has had visions of a man in the night, posed 0:07:21.880 --> 0:07:25.360 against the red light, the danger light at the mouth 0:07:25.400 --> 0:07:29.120 of the tunnel. The figure stands with one arm raised up, 0:07:29.280 --> 0:07:33.000 waving violently, and the other arm thrown over his eyes 0:07:33.080 --> 0:07:36.720 like a blindfold. And when the signalman sees the figure, 0:07:36.800 --> 0:07:40.640 he hears a voice calling out, saying Helloa below there, 0:07:40.880 --> 0:07:44.240 look out, And then as suddenly as it appeared, the 0:07:44.240 --> 0:07:48.400 figure vanishes into darkness. And twice before at the time 0:07:48.400 --> 0:07:51.320 of the story, the signalman has seen this shadow man 0:07:51.440 --> 0:07:53.920 in the red light and heard the voice, and then 0:07:54.000 --> 0:07:58.880 immediately after those visions, disaster has fallen somewhere nearby on 0:07:58.920 --> 0:08:02.240 the tracks. One time it was a terrible engine collision 0:08:02.320 --> 0:08:05.160 in which many people were killed. Another time it was 0:08:05.280 --> 0:08:08.120 the sudden and mysterious death of a young woman riding 0:08:08.160 --> 0:08:12.760 on board a passing train. And so now the signalman 0:08:12.960 --> 0:08:15.960 is not only haunted by this vision, but by what 0:08:16.000 --> 0:08:18.600 it means. When he sees it and when he hears 0:08:18.640 --> 0:08:21.520 the voice, he knows there will soon be a disaster, 0:08:21.880 --> 0:08:24.480 and he wants to telegraph the station so he can 0:08:24.560 --> 0:08:27.840 perhaps avert it. But he has no idea what the 0:08:27.880 --> 0:08:30.680 disaster will be, and he can't explain the reason he 0:08:30.760 --> 0:08:33.320 knows it's coming, so he can't give a warning that 0:08:33.360 --> 0:08:36.920 anybody will heed. So he's tortured with this terrible knowledge 0:08:36.960 --> 0:08:40.640 that he can't use to help anyone. Now the narrator 0:08:40.679 --> 0:08:43.480 is troubled by all this. He seems to believe that 0:08:43.520 --> 0:08:46.560 the man is suffering from a nervous condition, and the 0:08:46.600 --> 0:08:48.800 next day he plans to come back and find a 0:08:48.840 --> 0:08:51.200 way to convince the signalman to go see a doctor. 0:08:51.760 --> 0:08:54.760 But when the narrator arrives at the trench in the 0:08:54.800 --> 0:08:57.800 earth the next day, he instead finds a large gathering 0:08:57.800 --> 0:09:02.400 of railroad officials on site. Apparently the signalman was cut 0:09:02.480 --> 0:09:04.880 down by a train the night before. He was standing 0:09:04.920 --> 0:09:07.640 in the tracks as if in a trance. The engine 0:09:07.679 --> 0:09:10.360 driver saw him as the train was approaching and tried 0:09:10.400 --> 0:09:11.920 to call out to him to get him to move 0:09:11.920 --> 0:09:14.560 out of the way, and he was calling out halloa 0:09:14.840 --> 0:09:18.440 below there look out and waved one arm violently to 0:09:18.440 --> 0:09:21.440 get the signalman's attention. But at the last moment, the 0:09:21.480 --> 0:09:24.240 engine driver was terrified of what he was about to see, 0:09:24.480 --> 0:09:26.760 and so he threw his other arm over his face 0:09:26.840 --> 0:09:27.760 to cover his eyes. 0:09:28.240 --> 0:09:29.600 Oh wow, I. 0:09:29.520 --> 0:09:32.080 Think it's a wonderfully chilling ending. Even now just telling 0:09:32.120 --> 0:09:34.319 it again, I got at a little bit of a 0:09:34.360 --> 0:09:39.240 shiver a goosebump there. Now you might think, because a 0:09:39.280 --> 0:09:42.160 lot of ghost stories, what they're really about is the ghost. 0:09:42.240 --> 0:09:44.760 And actually you could say that it's arguable whether or 0:09:44.840 --> 0:09:47.559 not this should be classified as a ghost story or 0:09:47.880 --> 0:09:50.600 whether it's actually a premonition story that just has a 0:09:50.679 --> 0:09:55.520 has a similar aesthetic reform to a ghost story. But 0:09:56.200 --> 0:09:58.480 you could argue that, yeah, maybe the setting is kind 0:09:58.480 --> 0:10:00.800 of incidental. What it's really about is the ghost and 0:10:00.800 --> 0:10:03.280 the human interaction. But I don't know. I think the 0:10:03.480 --> 0:10:06.720 railway setting is not incidental here. I think the setting 0:10:06.720 --> 0:10:10.920 along the tracks is actually quite thematically central. It matters 0:10:11.000 --> 0:10:14.360 that the signalman is a signalman, like what his job 0:10:14.520 --> 0:10:18.280 is is core to the anguish that he's suffering with 0:10:18.360 --> 0:10:21.520 this terrible knowledge, and the fear and the dread and 0:10:21.559 --> 0:10:25.480 the gloomy atmosphere and the danger are all centrally based 0:10:25.520 --> 0:10:29.800 on railroad technology. And you can tell and even that 0:10:30.000 --> 0:10:35.160 Dickens himself had strange, I would say, at best, ambivalent 0:10:35.200 --> 0:10:37.880 feelings about rail travel and its effects on the world. 0:10:38.440 --> 0:10:41.280 There's a different story in this same collection, Mugby Junction, 0:10:42.320 --> 0:10:45.839 where Dickens is writing about a character looking down at 0:10:45.840 --> 0:10:49.360 a railroad junction and says, but there were so many 0:10:49.400 --> 0:10:52.480 lines gazing down upon them from a bridge at the junction. 0:10:52.920 --> 0:10:56.120 It was as if the concentrating companies formed a great 0:10:56.240 --> 0:11:01.240 industrial exhibition of the works of extraordinary ground spiders that 0:11:01.400 --> 0:11:02.280 spun iron. 0:11:02.920 --> 0:11:05.280 Oh wow, that's nice anyway. 0:11:05.320 --> 0:11:07.120 All that to make the point that I think a 0:11:07.160 --> 0:11:10.040 lot of these horror stories that are about trains are 0:11:10.080 --> 0:11:13.959 not incidentally about trains. They're not just stories that could 0:11:14.000 --> 0:11:16.280 be set anywhere that just happened to be a setting 0:11:16.360 --> 0:11:18.600 the author liked. I think a lot of them really 0:11:18.640 --> 0:11:22.800 are in serious ways about trains and what trains mean. 0:11:23.800 --> 0:11:27.360 Yeah, yeah, And this is a really fascinating subject to 0:11:27.400 --> 0:11:29.719 get into, and I feel like I do have to 0:11:29.760 --> 0:11:32.640 like mention at the top of all this that I 0:11:32.679 --> 0:11:37.040 love trains. I enjoy riding on trains, subway or otherwise, 0:11:37.160 --> 0:11:40.400 bullet trains everywhere, ever, and I've really enjoyed trains. I 0:11:40.480 --> 0:11:43.240 live next to a train track, I've lived next to 0:11:43.280 --> 0:11:46.480 it for over a decade, and I still find reasons 0:11:46.520 --> 0:11:50.920 to enjoy watching the trains go by, or especially the 0:11:50.960 --> 0:11:55.079 trucks on the tracks and various maintenance equipment or special loads. 0:11:55.400 --> 0:11:59.439 Occasionally that occurs, and I get a kick out of that. 0:12:00.040 --> 0:12:03.240 Suffice to say, trains are very every day to me, 0:12:04.640 --> 0:12:08.080 and I like them. I don't inherently think they are creepy. 0:12:08.120 --> 0:12:11.360 And yet at the same time, there is something about 0:12:11.400 --> 0:12:14.000 the train that fits so well, not only fits well 0:12:14.000 --> 0:12:16.760 within these stories, but serves as a great skeleton for 0:12:16.760 --> 0:12:19.000 these stories. And a lot of it comes down to 0:12:19.640 --> 0:12:24.800 ideas that the train itself there's something unnatural about it. 0:12:24.840 --> 0:12:28.200 There's something really almost a sense of future shock that's 0:12:28.240 --> 0:12:31.760 never gone away, you know. And also the idea that 0:12:31.760 --> 0:12:35.760 the train is a location is inherently unnatural, and there's 0:12:35.800 --> 0:12:40.240 something about it that is sort of inherently haunted. And 0:12:41.320 --> 0:12:43.319 there are different ways to approach this, and I was 0:12:43.480 --> 0:12:45.880 I was thinking about this, and I was looking up 0:12:45.960 --> 0:12:48.680 various short stories and works of horror and thinking about 0:12:48.720 --> 0:12:53.480 various movies as well that use train settings, and some 0:12:53.520 --> 0:12:55.760 of them are you know, you can find overt examples 0:12:55.800 --> 0:12:58.160 of like, Okay, this is a movie about a train 0:12:58.320 --> 0:13:01.520 with a killer on the train. You know it's you know, 0:13:01.600 --> 0:13:05.320 it is just a setting for murders. Plenty of examples 0:13:05.360 --> 0:13:08.840 of that. But one of the examples that I think 0:13:08.880 --> 0:13:11.640 came to my mind the most, and this is one 0:13:11.640 --> 0:13:14.800 that I remember watching an adaptation of it when I 0:13:14.840 --> 0:13:19.679 was younger. This comes from the works of Sarrothur Conan 0:13:19.720 --> 0:13:23.760 Doyle and a particular short story titled The Adventure of 0:13:23.800 --> 0:13:28.800 the Copper Beaches. This would have been an eighteen ninety 0:13:28.840 --> 0:13:32.760 two tale, and I vividly remember watching the Jeremy Brett 0:13:32.880 --> 0:13:35.480 Granada television adaptation of this when I was a kid. 0:13:35.480 --> 0:13:37.480 You can find this streaming, and you can get this 0:13:37.600 --> 0:13:41.400 on disc as well. These were all really accurate adaptations 0:13:41.400 --> 0:13:45.240 of the shlock Comb stories. But basically this does not 0:13:45.280 --> 0:13:47.520 involve a haunted train. There's not even a murder on 0:13:47.640 --> 0:13:50.680 the train or anything of that nature. It's just Holmes 0:13:50.679 --> 0:13:53.960 and Watson are taking the train into the countryside to 0:13:54.000 --> 0:13:57.800 look into particular crime. And at first Holmes is consumed 0:13:57.800 --> 0:14:00.160 by his newspaper much of the way you know, or 0:14:00.200 --> 0:14:03.320 today he'd be on his iPhone or something. But he 0:14:03.400 --> 0:14:06.280 finally puts his newspaper way and he begins to survey 0:14:06.360 --> 0:14:09.440 the scenery outside the window, and he makes a kind 0:14:09.440 --> 0:14:12.320 of terrifying observation. He goes on a bit of a 0:14:12.400 --> 0:14:14.920 rant multiple paragraphs that I can't I can't read all 0:14:14.960 --> 0:14:18.360 of it here, but I'm going to read essentially unabridged version. Okay, 0:14:18.840 --> 0:14:22.280 So Holmes says the following to Watson, you look at 0:14:22.320 --> 0:14:25.640 these scattered houses and you are impressed by their beauty. 0:14:25.760 --> 0:14:28.080 I look at them and the only thought which comes 0:14:28.120 --> 0:14:30.600 to me is a feeling of their isolation and of 0:14:30.640 --> 0:14:34.280 the impunity with which crime may be committed there. They 0:14:34.320 --> 0:14:37.960 always fill me with a certain horror. It is my belief, Watson, 0:14:38.000 --> 0:14:41.360 founded upon my experience, that the lowest and vilest alleys 0:14:41.400 --> 0:14:44.320 in London do not present a more dreadful record of 0:14:44.400 --> 0:14:48.720 sin than does the smiling and beautiful countryside. The pressure 0:14:48.760 --> 0:14:51.120 of public opinion can do in the town what the 0:14:51.240 --> 0:14:54.920 law cannot accomplish. There is no lane, so vile that 0:14:54.920 --> 0:14:57.360 the scream of a tortured child or the thud of 0:14:57.400 --> 0:15:01.760 a drunkard's blow does not beget sympathy and indignation among 0:15:01.800 --> 0:15:04.560 the neighbors. And then the whole machinery of justice is 0:15:04.560 --> 0:15:07.440 ever so close that a word of complaint can set 0:15:07.520 --> 0:15:09.920 it going. And there is but a step between the 0:15:10.000 --> 0:15:13.320 crime and the dock. But look at these lonely houses. 0:15:13.720 --> 0:15:16.800 Think of the deeds of hellish cruelty, the hidden wickedness 0:15:16.800 --> 0:15:20.200 which may go on year in year out in such places, 0:15:20.240 --> 0:15:22.960 and none the wiser. It is the five miles of 0:15:23.040 --> 0:15:24.640 country which makes the danger. 0:15:25.000 --> 0:15:27.520 That's a very interesting paragraph because it strikes me as 0:15:27.560 --> 0:15:31.440 both containing some wisdom and truth but also representing a 0:15:31.440 --> 0:15:35.320 pathological way of thinking. You know, it's like, yeah, there 0:15:35.400 --> 0:15:38.520 is some correct observation there, but also it's just it 0:15:38.720 --> 0:15:42.440 reveals Holmes's way of looking at the world as just 0:15:42.560 --> 0:15:46.040 like a place of dangers and miseries. And you can 0:15:46.080 --> 0:15:49.600 sort of do an inventory of the potential for dangers 0:15:49.600 --> 0:15:51.560 and miseries by looking at any place. 0:15:52.040 --> 0:15:56.440 Yeah, yeah, yeah, it definitely reveals something of Holmes's nature. 0:15:57.360 --> 0:16:00.400 And again it's the train itself is not creepy. Here 0:16:00.840 --> 0:16:02.800 in the adaptation, and in the book you get the 0:16:02.880 --> 0:16:05.760 very homes the insense of, oh, these are just gentlemen 0:16:05.800 --> 0:16:09.600 on a train, But then when you get this morbid observation, 0:16:09.840 --> 0:16:13.120 Ultimately it's about how the countryside is creepy and not 0:16:13.160 --> 0:16:16.000 even the city is creepy. But there's something about the 0:16:16.040 --> 0:16:17.960 train technology's role in this. 0:16:18.560 --> 0:16:21.880 Absolutely, yes, I would have no way of proving that 0:16:21.880 --> 0:16:24.160 that Arthur Conan Doyle was actually trying to make this 0:16:24.200 --> 0:16:26.880 particular point, but I would not be surprised if this 0:16:27.040 --> 0:16:30.200 kind of observation was actually a statement about the way 0:16:30.320 --> 0:16:33.960 a train changes the way you look at the world. 0:16:34.640 --> 0:16:37.760 Yeah. Yeah, it's about the vantage point that it provides, 0:16:38.080 --> 0:16:42.080 the broadening human travel abilities. It permits Holmes a chance 0:16:42.120 --> 0:16:45.040 to observe something terrifying about human nature and human civilization. 0:16:45.720 --> 0:16:48.640 And it's a scene that I think just got stuck 0:16:48.640 --> 0:16:50.680 in my head at an early age. So I literally 0:16:50.720 --> 0:16:53.120 think about the scene almost any time I'm on a train, 0:16:54.360 --> 0:16:56.160 certainly if it's a novel train and I get to 0:16:56.400 --> 0:16:58.640 look out at the countryside. 0:16:58.000 --> 0:17:00.560 Which, by the way, I love doing. Robert, I'm like you, 0:17:00.640 --> 0:17:03.960 I also very much love trains. I mostly have just 0:17:04.080 --> 0:17:08.000 positive feelings about them, So I did not pick this 0:17:08.080 --> 0:17:12.399 topic because I think trains are inherently creepy, but maybe 0:17:12.400 --> 0:17:16.560 because they're sort of cuddly to me. I wonder I'm 0:17:16.600 --> 0:17:19.400 interested in the way is that they might bring terrors 0:17:19.400 --> 0:17:21.600 to mind for many people, especially people in say the 0:17:21.680 --> 0:17:22.560 nineteenth century. 0:17:22.920 --> 0:17:25.720 Yeah, yeah, but seriously, I'll be riding a train. Like 0:17:25.800 --> 0:17:28.119 even more recently, a few months back, I had to 0:17:28.200 --> 0:17:30.560 ride the Bullet train in Japan. Look out of the 0:17:30.560 --> 0:17:34.240 beautiful countryside, and yet here's Sherlock Holmes whispering my ear. 0:17:34.520 --> 0:17:38.960 They might be murdering in there, so thank you, Sherlock, but. 0:17:39.000 --> 0:17:40.919 They think of the horror is hidden beyond. 0:17:41.200 --> 0:17:41.440 Yes. 0:17:53.119 --> 0:17:56.239 Now, Another tale that comes to mind concerning trains is 0:17:56.320 --> 0:17:59.560 the Ray Bradberry story The Town where No One Got Off, 0:18:00.200 --> 0:18:02.480 And I'm mostly familiar with this one from a nineteen 0:18:02.520 --> 0:18:06.840 eighty six adaptation on the Ray Bradberry Theater television show 0:18:07.400 --> 0:18:10.920 starring a young Jeff Goblin. Oh or you know, this 0:18:10.960 --> 0:18:13.280 was what the same year as The Fly, so you 0:18:13.320 --> 0:18:16.200 know young Jeff Goblin. I don't remember how old he 0:18:16.200 --> 0:18:18.760 would have been at this point in his career, but anyway, 0:18:19.960 --> 0:18:22.040 so this is another story where the train itself is 0:18:22.080 --> 0:18:25.800 not creepy, but there's something about the way it connects 0:18:26.000 --> 0:18:28.960 people in places that takes on a very sinister air. 0:18:29.600 --> 0:18:32.040 So in this story, we follow a man from the city, 0:18:32.560 --> 0:18:35.480 this is Jeff Goblum's character in the adaptation, who takes 0:18:35.480 --> 0:18:39.120 a train ride out into the countryside to confirm, according 0:18:39.119 --> 0:18:42.520 to him, his ideals about country living and his of 0:18:42.520 --> 0:18:46.840 course curiosity with this particular stop where nobody ever gets off. 0:18:47.359 --> 0:18:49.919 You know, what is it with this town? And you 0:18:49.960 --> 0:18:52.879 know this also ties into some general fascination with train travel. 0:18:52.960 --> 0:18:54.640 You're like, well, what is this stop? Who lives here? 0:18:54.680 --> 0:18:59.200 Who are these people? And he meets up and tags 0:18:59.240 --> 0:19:04.680 along with an old countryman during this journey. And there's 0:19:04.680 --> 0:19:06.639 a twist though, and I'm about to spoil it, so 0:19:06.800 --> 0:19:09.239 skip ahead, pause, and so forth if you don't want 0:19:09.280 --> 0:19:11.600 it to be spoiled. But the twist is that the 0:19:11.640 --> 0:19:14.439 city man has ventured out to the country to commit 0:19:14.480 --> 0:19:17.720 the perfect murder of a stranger, and the old man 0:19:17.960 --> 0:19:20.680 has lured him out to do the same, to commit 0:19:20.720 --> 0:19:24.480 the perfect murder of a city guy who has wandered 0:19:24.480 --> 0:19:26.960 into the country. And I'm going to read it just 0:19:26.960 --> 0:19:31.200 a quick quote here from the original rape Bradbury short story. Now, 0:19:31.280 --> 0:19:34.399 the darkness that had brought us together stood between the 0:19:34.520 --> 0:19:37.879 old man, the station, the town, the forest were lost 0:19:37.920 --> 0:19:40.399 in the night. For an hour, I stood in the 0:19:40.480 --> 0:19:45.959 roaring blast, staring back at all that darkness. Oh so 0:19:46.240 --> 0:19:48.639 this is a story that works in a number of ways, 0:19:48.680 --> 0:19:51.960 exploring course, just the darkness of human nature and you know, 0:19:52.160 --> 0:19:56.280 temptation to do evil and so forth, our attitudes towards others, 0:19:56.720 --> 0:19:59.160 and perhaps as well a little commentary on the idea 0:19:59.200 --> 0:20:01.760 that you still see in modern objections to say, the 0:20:01.800 --> 0:20:04.600 expansion of city rail, that oh well, if you do this, 0:20:04.640 --> 0:20:07.720 it's gonna allow criminals to just move around super easily. 0:20:07.760 --> 0:20:10.080 They'll just they'll just go right into the into the 0:20:10.600 --> 0:20:12.960 really nice parts of town and just start doing crimes. 0:20:14.560 --> 0:20:16.320 But and then on top of all of this, I 0:20:16.359 --> 0:20:19.080 feel like this there is also this sense of the 0:20:19.160 --> 0:20:24.200 train is a technology that shortens the distance between individuals. 0:20:24.200 --> 0:20:27.399 So it brings us closer together. But does it maybe 0:20:27.440 --> 0:20:30.560 bring us too close? You know? Is it does it 0:20:30.640 --> 0:20:33.760 just it just opens up the room for it breaks 0:20:33.800 --> 0:20:37.000 down barriers that should be in place, that sort of thing. 0:20:37.720 --> 0:20:40.000 Hmmm, I'm gonna have to think on that. But in 0:20:40.040 --> 0:20:41.760 a minute, I do want to get into talking about 0:20:41.760 --> 0:20:44.160 some of the most common themes I feel like I've 0:20:44.240 --> 0:20:47.760 observed in train related horror stories, and so maybe this 0:20:47.800 --> 0:20:49.560 will come back up then. But before we do that, 0:20:49.680 --> 0:20:52.000 I know you wanted to mention a few more examples. 0:20:52.400 --> 0:20:54.360 Yeah, so these are gonna be a little more in passing, 0:20:54.400 --> 0:20:55.960 but I was just trying to list off a few 0:20:55.960 --> 0:20:58.280 in my head that stood out. The Midnight Meat Train 0:20:58.359 --> 0:21:01.520 by Clive Barker. If you're only familiar with the movie, 0:21:01.840 --> 0:21:04.040 let me just remind you that the original Books of 0:21:04.040 --> 0:21:05.880 Blood short story is quite good. 0:21:06.320 --> 0:21:08.760 It's one of those stories where, if this makes any sense, 0:21:08.920 --> 0:21:11.800 I kept expecting it to turn out to be less 0:21:11.880 --> 0:21:16.359 literal than it was, and like the literalness of the 0:21:16.400 --> 0:21:18.480 payoff is actually kind of genius. 0:21:20.119 --> 0:21:22.720 Yeah, and I think your words better in short story format. 0:21:23.600 --> 0:21:26.919 Another one is The Tall Grass by Joe R. Lansdale. 0:21:27.480 --> 0:21:31.280 This one was adapted on the Love and Robots television 0:21:31.359 --> 0:21:35.640 series the animated anthology series, and it's quite good. Involves 0:21:35.960 --> 0:21:38.320 a train sort of I forget if it breaks down 0:21:38.359 --> 0:21:40.560 or slows down, but it kind of gets into that 0:21:40.600 --> 0:21:42.880 area of like, oh, the train is something that connects 0:21:43.240 --> 0:21:45.600 point A to point B, but then what goes on 0:21:45.640 --> 0:21:48.120 in between and the idea that you know, you're you're 0:21:48.119 --> 0:21:51.240 often going through you know, very isolated countryside or you know, 0:21:51.280 --> 0:21:55.359 so it seems to the observer. Yeah, let's see getting 0:21:55.600 --> 0:21:59.520 into the realm of not only train horror fiction, but 0:21:59.600 --> 0:22:02.000 subway horror fiction, which we already got into a little 0:22:02.000 --> 0:22:04.840 bit of Midnight Me Train. There's an excellent older weird 0:22:04.840 --> 0:22:09.120 fiction tale called far Below by Robert Barbara Johnson, and 0:22:09.400 --> 0:22:11.960